Metal-containing and Metal-free systems for small molecule activation

The objective of this thesis is to investigate small molecule activation with metal-containing and metal-free systems. Chapter 2 describes a tri-aryl benzene ligand scaffold for multimetallic N2 activation. A RuCp* complex was synthesized and characterized by NMR and X-ray crystallography. It offered an easy entry to understanding of the ligand coordination environment. Additionally, several multi-iron complexes were also obtained even though they were not the desired products. However, they still demonstrated the feasibility of using this ligand to effect multimetallic chemistry. Chapters 3 to 5 describe a series of compounds with charge-separation feature. These compounds could not only bind CO2 reversibly, but also catalyze the hydroboration of CO2 with a wide borane scope. In Chapter 3, a possible intermediate from the catalytic cycle was isolated and it partly revealed the mechanism of the catalytic reaction.Ph.D